Page 5 of The Distiller's Darling

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Naomi opened one eye and examined the ceiling until she remembered where she was. Ah, yes. The gala. The hotel. The Irishman.Yum. She yawned and stretched, feeling the burn of muscles well-used. Iain’s elevator antics had been just the start of their fun last night.

Fortunately, his room was only on the fifth floor. The elevator’s security cameras might have burst into flames if they’d traveled any higher. They’d stumbled out of the compartment and down the hall in a haze of lust, and her dress and his pants had dropped on top of each other right inside the door to his room. And then … well.

Naomi pointed her toes and smiled, feeling satisfaction spread like warmth through her body as the muscles in her legs stretched and loosened.

Iain had made good on his dirty promises of a feast. Her body had been appetizer, entrée, and dessert, and then she’d happily returned the favor. They’d spent a great deal of time gasping, panting for breath, and moaning—and quite a bit of time laughing as well.

On the whole, definitely a night to remember.

And now it was time for the part that sometimes turned awkward: leaving.

She turned in the bed, and found Iain watching her through lowered lashes. “Hello.”

“Good morning.” He reached out a lazy arm and wrapped it around her waist, tugging her body flush against his.

She relaxed against his warmth for a moment, then stretched up for a quick kiss. “Can I use your shower?”

“Be my guest,” he said with a yawn.

She slid out of the bed with a final pat on his extremely well-muscled thigh. “Thanks.”

Knowing Iain was watching her walk naked through the room, she put a bit of flair into her bend as she snagged her dress from the floor on the way into the bathroom. She heard a quick intake of breath behind her and grinned. It was nice to leave a lasting impression.

She closed the door behind her and flipped on the shower spray, letting the water warm up before she stepped in. She took advantage of the tiny hotel-branded shampoo and conditioner bottles set decoratively in the soap dish; Iain either wasn’t the sort of man to use anything but his own hair products, or he hadn’t been here long enough to need them yet. She was betting on both, actually. She worked the conditioner into her hair, grimacing at the familiar scent.

Her parents’ penthouse was near here, so she frequently stayed at this hotel when she came to the city to visit. She certainly wasn’t staying with them. Letting her mother have the opportunity to eavesdrop on her comings and goings was something she’d learned to avoid years ago. So she stayed in a hotel, or once in a great while in Jacob and Tanya’s guest room if she thought she was up to being pummeled by several sets of tiny fists at six o’clock in the morning.

But her parents would probably be selling their place soon, she reflected. Her mother’s favorite hobby—aside from interfering in her children’s lives and supporting her husband’s ambitions, of course—was buying properties and re-decorating them. Naomi had to admit that her mom had impeccable taste. Judith Klein would probably be horrified to hear it, but Naomi was pretty sure that her artistic talent had come from her mother. Naomi, my dear, art is very well for a hobby. But you need to have goals. Her mother’s voice echoed in her head.

Naomi finished rinsing the conditioner out of her hair and smirked. Turns out, she did have goals. She’d met a lot of them, in fact, and then dreamed up more. And the gallery owner she was meeting in a few hours was the key to her next one. She’d picked her hotel for this trip to be closer to that meeting than the gala and her parents, but she’d wound up here anyway. Funny how things worked out. She hardly minded, though. A shower here, and a stop at her hotel to change clothes and check out, and she’d be on her way to being the next featured artist at Z Gallery.

She soaped and rinsed her body quickly, smiling as her fingers met the flesh Iain’s clever hands had shaped the night before. As a sculptor, Naomi knew all about how to mold a person’s curves, and Iain was damn talented at it. She shut the water off, then squeezed the dripping length of her hair over the drain until it seemed safe to step out of the tub without creating a flood. She reached past the curtain toward where the towels were folded, but when her hand encountered flesh instead of terrycloth, she yelped in surprise.

“Not every morning a man gets goosed when he goes to piss,” Iain’s voice came from beyond the shower curtain. He sounded amused.

“Sorry! Can you hand me a towel?”

“Here.” His hand came through the curtain holding the white towel, still folded. “Sure you don’t want me to return the favor?”

She took the towel and laughed as she wrapped it around her body. “You’re too kind.” She swept the curtain open. “Hand me another?”

“Here you are.”

She took the second towel and bent to wrap it around her hair, twisting it quickly before she straightened. “Thanks.” She stepped out of the tub, giving in to her baser impulses and fastening her hands on his hips to balance herself.

He reached back and palmed her breast through the towel. “Still nice,” he murmured. He turned to face her fully, and she saw that he was hard again. “One more for the road?”

She was tempted, but she had a schedule to keep. She reached down and stroked him twice. “I can’t.”

He lowered his head to rest his forehead against hers. “Cruel woman.”

“Successful woman.” She reached further and tickled the sensitive area behind his balls, and he hissed in a breath.

“I stand by my previous statement.” He grabbed her hand and ignored her grin. “If you’re not going to do anything with that, put it away. You can’t go waving deadly weapons around like that.”

She laughed. “Sorry. I have a meeting.”

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